"Eight will enter, three will leave!" Come on, say
it with me, "Eight will enter, three will leave!" Dyin'
time is nigh.

Welcome to Titan the Arena, the only game where it doesn't
matter who dies, as long as you didn't bet on him. Place your
bets on who you think will survive, and play your strength cards
to make sure they do. Rounds continue until only three live,
and whoever has the biggest payoff from their bets wins. What
could be more fun?

Again this year I decided to have three preliminary heats leading
up to (optimally) a semi-final of 25 players. The winners of
each of the five games in the semi will compete in a final to
determine who will take home the wood.

To determine the 25 players who will play in the semi-final,
I will use the following criteria based on the WBC Standard MESE
tie-breakers in this order of precedence:

1) Win in first Heat entered
2) Most Wins
3) Win in second Heat entered
4) Win in third Heat entered
5) Has brought a copy of the game, if needed for next round;
6) Average finish in all heats entered; e.g., a 2nd and two 3rds
= 2.67 and beats a 2nd and two 4ths (average: 3.33)
7) High dice roll

If I don't have 25 players who won at least one game, I will
fill with those who won second in at least one game, using a
modification of the tie-breakers above:

1) Second in first Heat entered
2) Most Seconds
3) Second in second Heat entered
4) Second in third Heat entered
5) Highest percentage of First place score
6) Average finish in all heats entered; e.g., a 2nd and two 3rds
= 2.67 and beats a 2nd and two 4ths (average: 3.33)
7) High dice roll

Last year we had 22 winners, and 21 of them elected to continue
to the semi-final, so we needed only four alternates who got
a second place in their heats. In all likelihood, we can expect
similar numbers this year.

The GM will be playing and will have two AGM's identified.

Note about the New Version: In 2004, Fantasy Flight
Games re-released this game, entitled Colossal Arena.
I am making the following pronouncement. Usage of this version
of the game will be allowed with the following provisos: 1) The
eight creatures that will be used are: Amazon, Cyclops, Ettin,
Magus, Titan, Troll, Unicorn, and Wyrm. Remove all strength cards
for the other four creatures from the deck before beginning play.
2) When the deck is exhausted, instead of ending the game immediately,
use the 'Original Stalemate Rules' as printed in the Official
FAQ (available at Fantasy Flight's website), which are the same
as the rules in the orginal game.

In the Final, there will be the option to play the new version
of the game according to its rules, but only if all five finalists
desire it. If a single one wishes to play with the original rules,
then that is what will happen. If the new version's rules are
used, the eight creatures used will be randomly determined, for
time considerations.

In order to make the two versions jive even more, I am instituting
this rule, applicible to all games of both versions: The method
of determining who begins play may be by strength card auction,
or by any random method agreeable to all players

One of the nice things that we did during the 2000 WBC TTA
Tournament was to fill out a relatively extensive data sheet
that recorded secret bets and creature kills for each campaign.
I thank those people who took the time to complete these charts
during their games. Their efforts are what I used to derive the
following analyses.

There were 30 campaigns played resulting in 60 total games.
Of those, only 55 games were evaluated because the rest of the
games had incomplete or non-legible records. 53 games were five-player
versions; only two games were four-players. Please note that
this evaluation is limited by three major factors. First, we
assumed that secret bets, creature kills and player diplomacy,
which happened in the first game, would not unduly influence
the second game. I did try to look into evaluating only the first
games played, but that resulted in only 28 games available for
evaluation and the results were not dramatically different from
this complete analysis. Second, we assumed that the likelihood
of creature kills and placement of secret bets for each of the
different creatures would result in the same expected value.
Of course, the differences are what's interesting about this
analysis. Finally, these analyses are based upon a rather small
sample of less than 60 games and "your mileage may vary".

We looked first at the secret bets that were placed on the
different creatures for the evaluated games (here, only 54 games
had available records). If we assume that all creatures are just
as worthy of secret bets and that initial card play and open
bets did not overly influence the choice of subsequent secret
bets, we can expect 33.5 bets placed on each creature (52 games
with five-players and two games with four-players) and considering
a no-secret bet as a mistake.

Secret Bets Placed

Number

Variance

Cyclops

27

-6.5

Warlock

30

-3.5

Dragon

32

-1.5

Titan

32

-1.5

Troll

32

-1.5

Hydra

33

-0.5

Ranger

37

+3.5

Unicorn

38

+4.5

None (expected should be 0)

7

+7.0

What this data suggest is a definite bias against betting
on the Cyclops, which is later reinforced by the fact that it
is one of the creatures that is killed early. As to whether the
lack of secret support dooms the Cyclops to being in the early
kill group or whether players just don't like the Cyclops' power,
it's unclear from this data (but perhaps the multiple-bid data
suggest that the lack of support dooms the Cyclops). However,
I would tend to agree with those players who see the Cyclops'
as having the most annoying power to the non-backers. I was a
bit surprised to see that the powers that I tend to prefer and
think of being useful (Dragon, Titan, Troll and Hydra) did not
significantly vary from the expected. I would have expected higher
positive variance rather than the relatively neutral deviation.
I was perplexed somewhat by the positive variance on the Ranger
and the Unicorn, since I only find these powers to be helpful
in specific situations.

Next, I took a look at which creatures got eliminated first.
With 55 games being evaluated, we would expect each creature
to be the "First Kill" 6.9 times in this data. As noted,
Cyclops got clobbered first rather resoundingly. Also, the Titan
was the first creature killed nearly as often. This seems to
suggest that these two "annoying" powers that can affect
another player's hand tend to bring unfriendly attention rather
rapidly. I would suggest from this data that you should not put
any secret wagers on these creatures unless you have some additional
support and ability to keep them alive.

First Killed

Number

Variance

Cyclops

12

-5.1

Titan

10

-3.1

Ranger

6

+0.9

Troll

6

+0.9

Warlock

6

+0.9

Dragon

5

+1.9

Hydra

5

+1.9

Unicorn

5

+1.9

Looking further along the continuum at the first three creatures
killed in a game, we see that it confirms the "loser"
nature of the Cyclops. However, the Titan appears to do much
better, once it survives the initial assault for the first kill.
Surprisingly, the Troll emerges as an increasingly likely target
to be killed when looking at the first three eliminations. Later
we will look at a "survivor"-analysis which may suggest
that this switch for the Titan and the Troll may be just an anomaly.
Based on 55 games evaluated, if this was random, we would expect
each creature to be one of the first three creatures eliminated
about 20.6 times.

First Three Killed

Number

Variance

Cyclops

31

-10.4

Troll

26

-5.4

Titan

22

-1.4

Ranger

20

+0.6

Hydra

19

+1.6

Unicorn

16

+4.6

Warlock

16

+4.6

Dragon

15

+5.6

Next, we attempted to determine whom among the TTA creatures
would be considered "survivors" and not likely to get
"voted" off the arena. With 55 games, we would expect
each creature to be one of the three survivors 20.6 times if
due to chance only. This analysis merely confirmed that the Cyclops
and the Titan were the least likely candidates to remain standing
at the end. Also, the Warlock appeared to be slightly vulnerable.
The most likely survivors appear to be what I consider to be
the two most powerful creatures, the Hydra and the Dragon. In
games that I play, I try to convince people that the Hydra and
the Dragon must be killed because of their powers, but perhaps
I should be looking into betting on them more often.

Survivor

Number

Variance

Titan

14

-6.6

Cyclops

16

-4.6

Warlock

18

-2.6

Troll

22

+1.4

Ranger

23

+2.4

Unicorn

23

+2.4

Hydra

24

+3.4

Dragon

25

+4.4

As an aside, it should be noted that in most of the games
played, the five eliminated creatures were killed by three or
four different players. Only in a handful of cases were all the
killings done by two different players. In no cases were there
the extremes of only one or all five players being involved with
the creature eliminations.

Finally, further analyses were done to reflect some of the
player interactions that are so important in the dynamics of
a multi-player card game such as TTA. Since we don't have actual
after-action reports that capture the thoughts, exact bets and
card play for this tournament, I attempted to use multiple secret
bets on creatures to serve as proxy for some of the player interactions
and its effect on creature survival. There were no games with
four or five secret bets on the same creature (this would be
likely limited by general card distribution at the beginning
of the game). However, there were 42 instances of double-secret-bids
on one creature and 12 instances of triple-bids on one creature.

Creature

Double Bets

Deaths

Triple Bets

Deaths

Unicorn

5

3

4

1

Ranger

9

3

1

0

Troll

3

1

2

0

Titan

4

1

1

0

Dragon

5

1

1

0

Cyclops

3

0

2

0

Warlock

5

0

1

0

Hydra

8

0

0

0

With this analysis, it appears that having multiple-bids on
the Unicorn and the Ranger weakens the ability of these creatures
to survive. Even with several players interested in the survival
of these creatures, they appear to be very vulnerable to elimination.
In contrast, while the Cyclops and Warlock may be easily eliminated
when backed by only one or no players, they appear to be stronger
when backed by several supporters. As expected, the Hydra and
the Dragon appear to be generally good bets based on this information.

In summary, there are many limitations to this analyses of
TTA and this information should be recognized as only providing
general thoughts on creature survivability and some ideas about
placing secret bets based upon some actual data. I have already
noted some of the caveats earlier, and certainly there are many
other strategies that have been discussed about betting and card
play for TTA in other forums. This analysis is not meant to be
a substitute for good game play, understanding of the game, opponent
psychology, card counting, etc., that occurs in any good card
game involving bidding. From this data, the two general rules
appear to be: 1) be very wary of placing secret bets or bids
on the Cyclops and the Titan, and 2) secret bets and bids on
the Dragon and the Hydra may be worthwhile and defendable.